Brad on Jewish identity, prison, and faith

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, I lived down there for a little while. And whereabouts did you live there? Pacific Beach. Right on the beach, actually. And you lived there? I lived there, and I can say that it was probably the most miserable time of my life. Oh, why? Why do you say that? It was, you know, doing drugs, a lot of drugs back then. Just not, just down. Oh, I got you. I'm like, San Diego is awesome. Oh, it was. Sandy beaches, you're just like, oh, yeah. And I lived right on the beach. I lived, literally, I could toss a stone and it would be on the beach, even if I didn't have a strong arm. So, growing up in Cleveland, in a predominantly Jewish town, then moving out to California, where it's a little more liberal. It's a little more goyish. A lot of Gentiles there, yeah. Was that hard to try to adjust to? Because it's almost like a sheltered life when you live in a town that everybody's pretty much the same. Yeah, absolutely. That's exactly. That's a very good way to put it. Sheltered here, it's kind of like the jungle. Yeah. You know, just all of, you know, you're right, though. It's very liberal, you know, but everything is here, every aspect. It's like a, you know, it's just a melting pot of, you know, ideologies, views, and a lot of other things. Okay, now, the drug thing. Did you get into that before you left home, or did that happen when you culture shocked out here? No, no, no, no. I was, that got, I started doing that back in Cleveland. And looking back at my. My childhood and life, I almost think that I was destined to do that, to fall into that. That's kind of weird saying that. A little bit, yes. That that was predestined. Well, I wouldn't say it was predestined. You know, I have, you know, I've, my insecurities and stuff as a child and, you know, even growing up into my teens and early childhood, looking back on it, it seemed very, very, very likely that that would have happened. Because of the why questions? What do you mean exactly? Exactly. Like. The answers that you were looking for that maybe you couldn't find. I wasn't really looking for answers back then. I was looking for excitement. And I was looking for a life. Something different? Yeah, yeah. Something outside of a normal life. You know, you know how people think that sometimes they're destined for, you know, great things or, you know, bigger things than your average person. So was your life really structured and your parents had kind of planned this is what you're going to be when you grow up? In general, kind of, you know. You know, you have to do this. You have to go to college, you know. Not that it's a bad thing to say things like that. But, you know, you, I was never molded into doing something specific, if that's what you mean. There was nothing, you know, saying. You're going to be a doctor. I was just thinking that. Or a lawyer. Yeah. Right, right. The stereotypes again that we're saying. But I wish I would have been one. I would have became one. Yeah, well, you seem intelligent enough, in my opinion. Thank you. To handle yourself in those areas. So how did you? How did you get out of the drug scene then if you were, you know, kind of drawn into that as looking for excitement? Jail, actually. Okay. Incarceration. Incarceration. You know, the inhumane incarceration. Although, in my case, I didn't do, you know, I had a few stints in jail and did a little bit of time. But it was the shock of losing my freedom. It set me, it's interesting because it set me onto a, the first time I got in trouble was in 2005. And I had already been a drug addict for. A decade at that point, pretty much. And I had never gotten in trouble. I never had any problems getting them. I always had a little bit of money in my pocket to get them. And all of a sudden out here, things started to, the floor started to crack and the bottom was falling out. So, and then I got in trouble. I got in trouble. I got arrested. And then my life completely changed. Okay. Now, did you do like, did you go to the pen or just? A hard time. Yes, I did one prison term in 2009. And I was sentenced to nine months total and did. Actually, I was sentenced to nine months. I was sentenced to 16 months. I'm sorry. And did nine months total. But I was only in prison. I was in, I was at a reception center, which was in Moscow. I was there for maybe three months. And that was very, very, very shocking. Say that again. Was it in Moscow? Moscow. I'm sorry. Moscow. It's in Bakersfield. It's a prison. In Moscow? Were you a spy? No, no, no. I've never been to Moscow. Yeah. I've never been to Moscow. Maybe I'd like to visit one day in the summer. Yeah. You know, but not. Not being shipped to a prison out there. No, no, no, no. You ever, no. You ever seen the way that they, the prisons there is awful. It's. You guys, the prisons out here, they're. They're a little more liberal. Yeah. They're like picnics. Walks in the parks compared to. Oh, flat screen TVs and HD and football and three square hot meals and you can sleep all day. Absolutely. Okay. Tell me about being Jewish though in the state pen. Or was it federal? No, state. State, state, state. No, I didn't. You didn't have the clout to get. No. I didn't. No. I'm not a, I'm not a hardened criminal. It was just stuff of some probation violations. Actually, that sent me to prison. It was actually my choice to go to prison, believe it or not. I wanted to get off of probation and I couldn't stand, you know, reporting in anymore to a, you know, an authority figure and having them tell me what to do, what to, you know, when to come in and I felt trapped. So I couldn't deal with that anymore. So my option was to either accept a deal that the state had offered me, which was only for four months, but extension of probation. And I said, no, I'll just take the prison and get away from it. Get over it. Because the laws had changed actually in 2009, actually, as they do change every year when it comes to prison. Um, if you're no longer a hell of a high level criminal, you do not have to report in to parole officers anymore. It's called NRP, non-revocable parole. So that really attracted me. Oh yeah. That was very attractive to me because another four years of having to report into somebody was, um, crazy. Yeah. Now you said something about being Jewish. In prison. Um, cause we were kind of talking about everything's segregated and everything's racially segregated and you have, you know, the white car and the white supremacists and that kind of stuff. And I'll be completely honest. And this is something I'm a little ashamed of. Um, I had omitted, if you want to say, or lied about being Jewish. I said, you know, maybe I should just keep my mouth shut and stay alive. Yes. You know, not get into the arguments or the, you know, the fights, whatever. And I, I did that at first. And then I thought, I, I can't keep doing this. It's what I am. It's who I am. And it's, you know, if somebody is going to hate me for it, then, you know. Oh, but I mean, when somebody hates you in prison, it's kind of a, you know, it's kind of a, so. Yeah. But that never, that never occurred. I, I have a sense of humor and, uh, you know. Your sense of humor got you through. My sense of humor got me through. I was actually, I was actually liked. So were there many other, um, like Jewish people there or? No, but I did, um, a few. No. Yeah. I did meet a few. There was actually an Israeli I met, um, weapons charges. Believe it or not. Shock, shock. Yeah. What a shock. And, um, there was another Jewish kid that grew up in Detroit that I had, uh, befriended. And, uh, it's funny. Everybody thought that we were brothers. Oh, wow. And we looked alike, I guess. But, uh. But did you have the Afro wigs on or? No, no, no, no, no, no. I've been losing, no, my hair is receding. Oh, no, no. Oh, you meant like, not brothers, brothers, but like. Like blood brothers. Oh, blood brothers. Yeah. Family. Yeah. I got you. Sorry. Sorry about that. No, no, it's okay. It's okay. Go ahead. Go ahead. They thought you were brothers and. Yeah. You know, they, you know, the, the, the making fun of and the, you know, but no, nothing. I'm all about it. It's nothing delicious and it's all in fun. So being Jewish in prison wasn't that big of a deal. Oh, okay. Yeah. So got through it. So. Yeah. I think it's much harder actually to be black in there. Oh. Yeah. And why do you say that? Because everything is racially segregated and, uh, you know, because of the prisoners in there, actually, they do it and the guards go along with it. And, um, they're out. They're outnumbered, I guess, from what I've seen, you know, and there's riots and, you know. Uh-huh. They get the worst end of it. Uh, yes. In some, at least in some cases, at least, you know, just from what I've seen. Right. You know. Right. That's, um. So while you were in there, did you see any riots or did you see anything like. Yeah. Yeah. I've seen, uh, I've seen a bunch of them. I've actually seen, I've seen a few people die. One person by natural causes actually. Um, another was stabbed. I didn't actually see it. The stabbing happened. I just saw the aftermath. But it was, uh, it was actually interesting. It was a white guy who was stabbed by other white guys because he was acting black. Whoa. And he, they found out he just had a rocking issue, right? Yeah. He's rocking with that cool walk. Yeah. You know, he had the sling, you know, whatever. He sprained his ankle. Yeah. They had a term for it, actually. They referred to him as a white crip, which I didn't get. I thought a crip was a, you know, a gang. Right. Yeah. You know. There's white crips, right? No. You say. I don't. Not that I know of. Are they? No. Yeah, there is. Bobby? I. I. Are you talking about a gang? Yes. Oh, yeah. Yeah. There's even, there's even white bloods. Yeah. That's a. Yeah. Because it's just a gang. It's not like a racially thing. It's a money thing. If you, if you look on the back terms of the bloods and crips. Yeah. They even have white people. They have Mexicans, Salvadorans. They don't care about the color. They care about. The money. What color. And the money. The color you're wearing. Right. Because if you think about it, if you bring other races into this, you get a bigger, a bigger plan. So if you bring Cubans, you get Cuban. You get Cuban, you know, goods and all that stuff. So why not bring every race towards it? But mainly. Yeah. I think though what they had labeled it as the definition of the way they put it was just somebody who, a white person who had acted black. I don't know if they meant that it was a white person actually in a gang, you know, because they, but yeah, they, they were going to kill him anyway. They would have found another excuse if they didn't have that one. Probably. I'm glad it wasn't you. Yeah. No, I don't have that much hop on my step. You know, I don't. No rocks in your shoes. Yeah. No, no, no, no, no, no. My vertical leap is low too. So you had said that when you were in there, when you first went into, into prison, that basically you didn't announce that you were Jewish. And then you felt like, well, that, that is my heritage. That is who I am. What are you, are you practicing now? Judaism or what are your beliefs in that? No, I don't practice any religion. I guess you could say that I'm agnostic. You know? Okay. In a sense. I, you know, growing up, I, you know, practice it a lot. And as soon as I got out of the house at 18, I stopped doing it. I would go to temple every now and then, you know, just to do it. But practicing, no. Okay. But, I'm sorry, go ahead. No, no, you go ahead. The, a lot of the Jewish traditions, and I would probably be argued with if some of them were here, are to me, cultural based, not necessarily religious based. But I have no problem even, you know, partaking in the religious. You know, the religious events that we have in our religion and culture, however you want to classify it. Okay, yeah. Go ahead. Go ahead, Denise. I was going to say, one of the things you had talked about earlier is there's different types of Judaism. What was the type that you were raised in? Reform conservative. Right, yeah. I think you already touched on that. But there are, there's the cedic and orthodox, which are the people you see with the hats and the, you know. How about the little curly thing? They're called, yeah, yeah, yeah, the locks. They're called. That's original. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And the taluses, you know what a talus is? The talus is the thing they wear, the thing they wear that hangs, you know, if you can see it hanging below their suits. Now, I can't answer you why they wear, if you were to ask, the top hats. I don't, I got to ask them that. Why do they all wear top hats? Hey, they want to be cool. Yeah, but. I mean, what's wrong with that, huh? Maybe it's the yarmulke thing, because, you know. I was going to ask you about that. What did the yarmulkes mean? It's out of respect for God, you know. Okay. But I think that you can wear anything over your head. I've actually, in Cleveland, I was. I saw somebody wearing a yarmulke that had a Cavs, Cleveland Cavaliers basketball on it. Yeah, so, you know, I think any kind of thing covering your head will do. But I didn't walk into a temple wearing a baseball hat, but, you know. Oh, yeah. You know. Well, again, if you look back years and years and years ago, wearing hats inside was disrespectful. Men didn't do that. So, just having the yarmulke on was like not a brimmed hat or anything like that. That probably had something to do with, you know, through the tradition. Yeah. You know, the traditions of going on and stuff. That's an interesting thing you say. I've always asked, and I can't get a straight answer. Maybe here somebody knows. Why is it disrespectful to wear a hat inside? I don't really see it. It's a cowboy thing, I think. No, it's way before cowboy time. Oh, British English stuff, right? Yeah, probably. I mean, I just know that women used to be supposed to cover their heads when they went in church, and men were to take their hats off when they went into church. Now, that's biblical. I mean, if you're going back like that, is that a woman is not supposed to worship, with her head uncovered, and a man is not supposed to worship with his head covered? And there's scripture on that, but I'm not. I'd have to. But the Orthodox do it in the Assyrians. Oh, well, I think it's in the first five books somewhere. Is it? Yeah. I don't believe it's, it's not New Testament. Wait, so why don't we wear, why we're not allowed to wear hats inside? It's always, I mean, I know I've always been racist, just disrespectful for a man to wear a hat. When you go in, you take your hat off out of respect. That's not just church. That's always anywhere. Well, yeah, well, when I was a police explorer, we'd always had our hats. And wherever we were, we had to take it off. Like, so if we entered a building, we'd have to take it off, and you have to put it on your side. Right. Now, depending on what side you put it on, depends on why you're there. And the reason why our police advisor told us that the reason why they do that, it's a sign of respect towards the people who died. So pretty much, you know, if my, like, I have aunts and uncles who died. So every time you walk into a place and you have to take off your hat, and pretty much, it's pretty much giving people respect who died for you. So pretty much because God always, because there is a story where God, where God walks in and someone's wearing a hat and he said, take off your hat. And they're all like, and they asked him why. He's all like, why? And he said, because that's showing respect towards my father. And it's showing respect towards your loved ones and the ones that passed away. Because if you have a hat on, it's like disrespecting them because you're not. In other words, like how I grew up raising is because the reason why if you have a hat on, it's like God can't see you or like your family members can't see you and they can't identify you. So like, that's what my, my, my church taught me. So that's why every time wherever I went, I'd always take off my beanie or I'd take off my hat and I do it just for a short time. Or if I mainly, mainly more what they respect more is the, is like it has to be done in church. So if you walk into a church with your hat, you need to take it off because even the pastor will come up to you or he will. Like I've been at churches where, they've been like, excuse me, sir, sitting in the third row, third aisle, third pew, three people down. Can you please take your hat off? And he argued with him. He goes, do you want the Lord to see you? He goes, cause you're, you feel like, cause God will feel like you're ashamed of him or you're hiding from him because of what you, what you did in your sin. Yeah. That's a whole nother show. And also the courtroom. I mean, you can't, they don't let you do that in the courtroom at all. But you can wear the, the yarmulke in a courtroom. You can. Because it's religious. Because it's a religious head covering. So you can wear that. In a courtroom. I wear my hat religiously. If native Indians can, you know, grow a peyote for religious reasons, legally, I think we should be allowed to wear a hat in a courtroom. Wow. You guys are getting off topic. I got it. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. But actually I have something on the topic again. I just remembered when you walk into a Jewish temple, it is mandatory that you have one on. In fact, they have a box that has yarmulkes in there. I think it's a little sanitary. Cause that's people sharing them. Jewish yarmulkes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. People sharing them, you know. It's so sanitary. It's so sanitary. Especially on Saturday and Sunday when, you know, the Hasidics and Orthodox don't shower. Oh, wow. Well, they're not supposed to use anything mechanical, you know, anything. The Sabbath? Exactly. Not just from sundown to sunrise. Friday sundown to Sunday. The sundown to sundown, actually. Friday sundown to Saturday sundown. Oh, okay. Well, that's interesting. So if me and you were to go to one of these, and they would have to make me wear it, but what if I said I'm not that religion? Like, I don't believe in wearing it. Because I'm Christian. But what I'm saying is, like, if I went with you to one of the temples, and you put it on, and you told me to put it on, and I was like, I don't wear it. It's not in my religion and all that. How do you think it would be? The Jews would get violent. You would not enter. Well, not necessarily. If we were, like, in a reformed temple, which is, you know, reformed. It's not conservative, and it's not Orthodox. It's not extreme. They might be okay with it. Nobody might say anything. I don't think so. It's like, even like some restaurants, you know, you have to have a shirt and tie on. You don't have a shirt and tie. They have ties you can wear for the night, and then you give them back the tie. You know, the same type of principle. If you want to come in here, this is what you're going to do. Right, right. I think less and less places are like that, though. I don't know. Like they're being more liberal? You're right. Not as, you know, less and less things are dressy. You know, there's less and less codes when it comes to that. I think it's, you know. Yeah, liberal, I guess, is the way to put it when it comes to that. There's a place that's, like, down the street, that Cheyenne's been wanting me to take her to. It's like they dress up, like, 50s or 60s style. They dress up all vintage, and the only way you can get in is if you're dressed all, like, you know, like, pachuccoed out pretty much, like old school status, like all nice dress. I love that stuff. The doo-wop stuff. Yeah. I love that stuff. But that's okay because they're promoting something. You mean, like, that's not. They're promoting a certain, you know, genre, if you want to call it, or a, you know, a feel of the club. That's understandable. Okay, let me ask you about Sunday school. You were talking about, I know we talked a little bit about Hebrew school, but when I think of Sunday school, I talk about, I think about being a little kid and going to Sunday school. But you were saying your Sunday school was. Well, it was like that. What was your Sunday school like? What do you. Yeah, you just went in and you studied about Jesus and learned Bible stories. Don't forget the snacks. You only get half the snacks. Well, it was actually on Sunday since Jewish people celebrate Saturday. No, they celebrate Saturday. Or not all Saturday. They celebrate, but go to church on Saturdays. Well, there's services in any temple on Friday night, Saturday morning. Saturday night, I'm not always sure about, but Sunday morning also. Oh, is there? But with the Orthodox and the Cedics, they're, you know, and that's why you see them walking. You know, they're biblical. They're, you know, they're acknowledging the Sabbath. So they walk to temple. So they live within, if you're Orthodox, you're living within probably a mile of where you're worshiping at. Because you're not supposed to walk any further than that? No, there's no. I don't. There's no set amount of distance you are or are not allowed to walk. It's just that you need to be close. And especially in Cleveland, you know, the weather and everything. Because they're faithful. They're loyal to it. What's funny is I just thought about if they see someone like me who they consider less than human sometimes because I don't practice that or didn't. They get aggressive. Oh, they've you know, they they they get mad. Oh, really? Yeah. They're not going to stone you like it tells them to. But they might come close. They do it in Israel. Actually, they stone ambulances and stuff like that and police cars on the Sabbath. Well, because there's supposed to be no work done at all. Any kind of work. I mean, I seen a program on TV where they were had the Orthodox Jews walking to to church. And I mean, even when it comes to temple, synagogue, temple, even when they I mean, even far as far as they prepare the food the day before because their women are not allowed to go and cook in the kitchens. I mean, it's no work whatsoever. Right. Nothing. There's nothing you're not allowed to use anything mechanical. I don't believe you're allowed to put anything into your mouth. Basically, your Sunday school was like our Sunday school, except for they're just teaching something different. Yes. I'm sorry. I got a little away from the question. Yeah, it was a little more intense. The Jewish religion is it's not as, you know, smiley and perky, perky, perky, perky is as maybe Christianity can be or, you know, maybe some forms of Catholicism, not forms, but whatever they teach you at church. And I just thought about this because I've been at church lately. I've been. I've been to a couple of Harvest, you know, and it's very peaceful. And the band is great. Right. You know, right. And in synagogue, they have a cancer, which is a female singer and very, very talented, you know, but it's not the same as a band playing. And, you know, let's party for Jesus. And there's a wide variety of Christian churches from, you know, if you're going to a Southern Baptist church, as far as what they do to a regular Baptist church, to a Protestant, I mean, there's some churches. You don't clap. You don't stand up. You don't you stand. You know, you sing the song that's no band. It might be a piano or something. So there's a wide variety, probably just like in the Jewish religion from what they may or may not have. Well, you know, it's becoming wider, like I said earlier, because of reformed temples or we could just call them liberal for argument's sake. And why do you think that? Because they want they want to draw in more people or. Why they're becoming more liberal or reform? No, because you're having. No, that's not at all what it is. They only want to draw in Jewish people. But the problem is that a lot of not the problem is I see it. But the problem that maybe a lot of Jewish people see is that a lot of people are marrying outside of their religion, faith, culture. Now, a lot of Jewish people, a lot of my friends are not married to Jewish girls. And you have to be you have to be born from a Jewish woman to be a Jewish person. Correct. And she, though, can go through a thing called the mikvah where they convert. How long does that take? I think it takes a couple of years. Take a couple of years. I mean, you know, it sounds like Christianity. It's easier to convert to. That just takes 30 seconds. Not even that. Ten words. Yeah, the Jewish religion is inclusive, if you want to call it that. But, you know, expanding outward now. Mm hmm. Yeah. And that's what I see. And yeah, so they want to grow it basically. Well, I don't know if they want to grow. It's just that they're they have to accept. They don't want to grow, actually, in my opinion. It's inclusive. They want to keep it. Yeah, I don't mean I don't mean grow. I don't want to shrink. They want to grow. Yeah. It just depends. Yeah, but they don't want they don't want to let everybody in. But they want to grow as a Jewish nation. Right. Right. OK, you're going to get on your. Yes, waiting to the twenty five minute mark. But I'll start now. OK. Did I answer everything that you asked me? I was there something left. Everything's great. But it's not through. You're not through. Oh, no, no, no, no, no. I didn't do it half time. OK. All right. It's time to have a look at what's going on and where you can get it going on. The best impression started home. Elite furniture for affordable prices. For more information, contact Richard Boyd at nine five one two one four eight five five five drama stage. Krumme run has a weekly veterans theater workshop. It's led by Melvin Ishmael Johnson and Earline Anthony. The workshop is on Wednesday nights from four to six p.m. and it's a free course, a free course in stage managing playwriting and more. If you'd like more information about this, feel free to contact. Me at two one three nine zero eight six five six seven or email him at drama stage one at Yahoo dot com. Positive light is back with the kayak. If you know anything about our organization, we have a history of taking children kayaking. We take inner city kids to take kids that are out of the city. We invite everyone to this event. The fundraiser will be held on August 22nd and the actual kayaking trip will be held on September 19th. So mark your calendars. Make sure to invite and look up some kids that be perfect for this outreach. Really excited about it. So spread the word. We'd like to thank our engineers, Cheyenne, for helping us. You're doing a great job as usual. Thank you, Cheyenne. If you'd like to be part of our show through sponsorship, you can contact us at nine five one seven eight nine one zero four six and to learn more about our nonprofit organization. It's called Positive Light Ministries. And if you want to make a donation, just visit our website, it's positive light dot org. And be sure to like us on Facebook at Facebook dot com slash. We are positive light. All right. Back to our discussion with Brad. Good job, Shantay. Yeah. So where were we when we where we left off? We were talking about. You're saying the interracial or not interracial, but. Oh, yeah. Interfaith or intercultural. Yeah, it's that is a good question, though. Is there like do you see a lot of like different other people like as far as like black Mexicans inside like inside the the temple or the temple? Well, actually, there's a lot of black Jews out there. You know, there's I grew up where I grew up. Actually, there's a whole community of them. It's a small community. But my current neighbor actually is a black Jew. He's got Jewish heritage. He looks it up on ancestry dot com. I don't know how accurate. There are actually some of them where they're actually born Jewish, where like his parents are Jewish and they're black, too. Or is it just like they're somewhere like, you know, they converted from from like Christianity or Catholic going into. No, I think that down the line they were, you know, because Judaism comes out of the Middle East, you know, which is right next to Africa and, you know, thousands of years ago, you know, the Jewish religion is very old, you know, so it was incorporated into a lot of people incorporated around that regions back then. So you were telling me that there's two kinds of Jewish people you're saying, there's like a white Jew and then there's a regional regional wise. I'm sorry, geographical wiser is Sephardic, which means Spanish and Hebrew. And then there's Ashkenazi, which is European. Because I have a friend that's half Brazilian and half Jewish. So is that like, well, Sephardic means that there's it's kind of like Sephardic is kind of like saying to me and I'll explain in a second calling Ohio or Missouri the Midwest when it's not the Midwest Sephardic means because of the Inquisition, which is the the Holocaust, which happened in the 15th century, I believe 16th century. All the Jews were ran out of Spain. So they they're called Sephardic for that reason. But they spread everywhere and they have different, you know, regional heritages, if you want to call it now. But the term is always there. You know, that's why I compare it to being Midwest. It's not really accurate necessarily because the Brazilians are Brazilian Jews. There's a lot of them actually. They they exiled thereafter, like the Holocaust. I believe a lot of them did. If you're not called exiled or, you know, they were migrated there. I don't know. Are you familiar with Bill Handel? Uh huh. He's from Brazil. Exactly. He's Brazilian. He's a Brazilian Jew. Yeah. He looks very white. Yeah, that's how my friend looks. Right. Right. Yeah. You wouldn't know that he was Brazilian or Jewish by looking at him just looks like a white. But most Brazilians are Portuguese. They're not of Hispanic descent. They're mostly Portuguese. A lot of them look white. I mean, they don't, you know, speak Portuguese. They have, you know, they're very heavily European influenced their heritage. So and just like a lot of mostly 90 percent of Jews are not Sephardic. They're European descent. But you'll see those ones that look maybe like they're from, you know, the Middle East or there's some that are, you know, there's some that are black. There's actually exclusive black synagogues for Jews. There's one I was reading about in Philadelphia recently. Well, yeah. And what were you reading about it? Just in general, how would you know, because people aren't. The article was probably meant to educate people about it. How not everybody's Jewish is white or curly hair. And yeah, I kind of wanted to and I'm hoping that you'll come back. On the show. Absolutely. And I want to get into, like I said, politics. But there's a lot of what some people are saying that the Jews are not white, that they're black and that my little niece was saying that they the the the Egyptians said that you went away black and you came back white. And they're they're all they're always talking that, you know, that thing. And I mean, what do you what do you think about that? Or do you have an explanation or. I mean, if you don't, you know, I'm just saying that's what I always hear. Are you asking why people why would they say that? And I mean, they they're like saying that refer to Jewish people as not being white. You're not being no not being Jews like you. You're not a real Jewish person to them because you're not black. You mean to the to the Orthodox or extreme religious people? No, to black people. Then I'm not a real Jew. Right. Because you're white. Oh. I've never heard that. Actually, I've heard the opposite of I've heard it's come from a lot of black people that I'm not white because I'm Jewish, you know, or I'm not of Caucasian descent, which I am. I mean, you know, it's obvious. It is obvious. Yeah. Yeah. But those never you never heard that then before. I have, but not much. Not much of that. That that you're not really Jewish and you're not really there. You're not really. You're not the descendants from from Abraham, Abraham and stuff, because if you were Middle Eastern and you're going to be more of the darker complected, you know, curly or hair black features. I showed you the pictures of my dad's side. You wouldn't say that they look that way. Most of them at least do. But, you know, there's a lot of you know, there is Jews or it says in the Bible that they're going to scatter throughout the earth. Right. You know, I mean, I don't I don't have a problem with it, but, you know, it seems like a lot of people and when you come back, well, we'll touch on these things and and, you know, kind of talk about that. But I want to ask you about your holidays, the Jewish holidays and which. Well, well, Hanukkah is my favorite. Eight gifts, you know, it's Christmas is Christmas just one night. Yeah. Eight times one year. Yeah. Yeah. You know, you get eight gifts. You know, I always got the best ones up front, though. The remaining six were usually not that good. Yeah. There are clothes I didn't want to wear. But so that would be your. Can you talk about you said you were telling me earlier that how many holidays are there? Well, there's probably a little south of a dozen, but there are a lot of them are very minor, like you're bringing up Esther and Haman. And I think there's a holiday based upon that called Purim, which is not a most Jews wouldn't even know what it is. It's just like a. Pilgrimage kind of like, you know, it's not a real real holiday. There's three actual major high holiday, actually two high holidays and three major I would consider the two being Russia Shana, which is the Jewish New Year, which happens in September, depending on when the moon is, you know, full circle. Also, the Yom Kippur, which comes ten days after, which is the day of forgiveness. Jews, the Jewish religion teaches you that you just can't go into the temple and talk to a priest about, you know, the affair you just had or whatever. Whatever sin you committed. It's there's one day a year and you have to fast from sundown to sundown to sundown, whatever, and that falls always ten days after the New Year. Then there's Passover, which falls in the spring during Lent for sure. Catholic or during the Easter time, which is biblical, biblically related. It's, you know, the 40 days, 40 nights in the desert. But it's based upon actually five days, I believe. And you're only allowed to eat unleavened bread, which is matzah. And, you know, because that's what they made. Yeah, they didn't have yeast and wheat and all that stuff. So they matzah is, you know, not non yeasted. And so that's what you eat for a week. Oh, and you loved it, right? No, I hated it. A lot of times we were in New York actually for spring break, which when I was in school and my father was a very strict Jew growing up. I would buy me a hot dog, but take the butt off. I'm like, I can't do this. I'm going to go back. That sucks. I mean, you know, I talk about a bun. Right. It's like, what's the purpose? What's the point? Right. I don't I want cheese and sauce on my pizza. I don't, you know. Right, right, right. But what do you with pizza? They took the they took the bread away. Right. So you would just get. Oh, you can eat pizza. There's no, don't even, you know, you can't just order cheese and sauce. Yeah, it wouldn't be pizza. Yeah, it wouldn't. You can have matzah pizza. Oh, matzah pizza is legal. Yeah, that's that's that's a they green light that the cheese and sauce is OK. It's just the bread. Yeah, right. So it has to be unleavened. Unleavened bread exactly is the way to put it. So I'm talking about Passover and stuff. I know there's a it's a big ritual as far as my understanding of where you sit at, you know, exactly what you what you eat. I mean, you have certain types of food. I mean, that's because they all symbolize absolutely. You know, so is that how it is with with with Hanukkah or Yom Kippur or anything where they have a strict. Hanukkah is is they usually. Traditionally have eaten potato latkes, which are, you know, I don't believe that's a Jewish thing, I think it's a cultural thing, isn't it? Potato pancakes. Yeah. Right. They were Irish. Yeah, I think I think German. So it's similar. It's European. Yeah. And, you know, for Yom Kippur, I always remember eating, you know, gefilte fish, salmon and, you know, some other noodle kugel and that kind of stuff. Noodle kugel. Noodle kugel. It's called it's raisins and noodle. The little cream cheese. It's half dessert, half not. Maybe you can cook some and then just bring it to us next time. I couldn't cook top ramen. Actually, I'm an awful cook. My mother, though, is I mean, she could whip up matzo bowl soup in her sleep. Wow. Yeah. That that is actually given on almost every holiday matzo bowl soup except for Hanukkah. She wouldn't break that out. It takes eight hours to make. Yeah. Done right. Done right. OK. Now we were kind of talking about the exodus. And when when the Jews left or they weren't Jews at that time, they were Hebrews. They were Hebrew slaves. Yeah. Hebrew slaves. And they left Egypt. And and I guess what I really want to ask is, is when did you start? And I know you said when did you know? That you were agnostic or just starting to leave the faith now, I think just listening to you that you're just. Fed up with it growing up with it and you're just tired of it and you just didn't want anything to do with it for those reasons. Now, is that what made you think, well, you know what? This isn't this isn't necessarily this is too much work. No, actually, I never really I always you could use the word disregarded it growing up. I had to go to temple or else I didn't get to watch TV. You know, there was some other kind of punishment. I disregarded it growing up. And, you know, we talked a little bit about my drug issues and I decided to incorporate God. I was able to believe in it. I was going through a very, very hard time. I was living out of my car. This is years ago. I was diagnosed with a virus which is gone. I just to bring it all out there because it's healthy to talk about. Lost my job. I had done hard drugs for the last time. My boss, who is still my boss, fired me at that time. I because I had gotten arrested and I decided it's time to take a change and to make a change and started praying and believing in God. What I didn't have any specific belief about who the God was I was praying to. But I incorporated it and I took it seriously. And I, I was given a Bible actually and started reading it and started questioning it a little bit. And, you know, I was reading some other things and was swayed more towards that. But like what kind of things were you questioning? The name of you. I was questioning specifically Genesis, you know, the beginning book of the Bible and the way it was put by the person who the Bible is, is the Bible. But it was done by a pastor out of Riverside. Actually, he has a lot of inserts in it and, you know, kind of tries to hold your hand as he guides you into faith. And I didn't really buy into what he was saying. So I immediately started questioning it. I'm a very inquisitive person. So and I was swayed the other way. You know, I wouldn't say I was swayed the other way. I was swayed halfway the other way and, you know, to an ignorant pool, I guess you can say. And I told Willis the other day, I claim ignorance when it comes to these things, you know, I don't know. And that's kind of what happened, you know. Oh, yeah. Well, that was I was kind of curious. You're, you know, growing up and a lot of people like they go to church or they make their children go to church, you know, three times a week. Like pastor's kids. Right. And then that that just turns them off completely. And they, you know, get of any kind of age where they have any kind of freedom, freedom or decisions can make their own decisions. They they make the decision to get the heck away from it because it's just too much. What you're talking about is actually very interesting. And I was questioning some Christians that I know on Riverside. I had gone back home a couple of years ago to Cleveland. I saw everybody, you know, the Jews and I had this whole new view of, you know, believing in God and stuff, and I wanted I wanted to always ask that people who I grew up with what they believed in, we never talked about it ever, ever, which is I find kind of strange. And I probably question three dozen people, three dozen Jews or more people I grew up with. And they kind of claim the same thing I do, which I found strange. They don't have very strong faith. Some of them do in a creator and with Christians. And to kind of answer what you were talking about, how they, you know, incorporating it with their children, making their kids go to church. They they buy into it. Kids buy into Christianity more so than they do. Judaism. In my opinion, I think excuse me, reminds me of my daughter in law's grandmother. She was very, very upset when she became a Christian and she says, you were born a Catholic, you'll die a Catholic. And, you know, didn't understand really what the Catholic religion because she didn't practice, you know, Catholicism, but that's what her grandmother believed in. So it's like you're born a Jew, you're died. You I mean, because that's what you are. Well, that's halfway true. But when it comes to religious beliefs, they are always a disposition. And it's you know, you you incorporate them into your life. You you don't you're not born into this world believing. I mean, I don't think so. That stuff, you know, I mean, you're you're taught it. You know, do I think I think that the majority of people, if if somebody was raised on an island and not taught the same things were taught in society, I've got to believe that they would believe in God, though, still, you know, because of ignorance and curiosity. Yeah. You go to India and there's like 18 million gods that, you know, at least even the in the backwoods jungle. They there's something in them that tells them they have to worship something. Yeah. Hinduism is a very exponentially polytheistic religion. I mean, they don't even I can't you couldn't even put a number on how many gods they have a million, millions, I think. And I mean, they there's something and I think all of us that needs to worship something. Absolutely. I believe that God put that in all of us and that we're supposed to worship him. And I mean, how does that work or why does you know, why is it like that? Or that's just the way it is. So, I mean, like a lot of people think it's brainwashing a child into like the atheists believe that you're brainwashing your child into believing the way you want them to believe and they don't really have a choice in the matter because that's all they really know. But they're doing the same thing also is, you know, you're you're you're setting forth an ideology, even if you're somebody who very loosely, you know, someone like me, I, you know, I thought about this. I don't have children. But if I were to raise them, if I were to have them, how what would I tell them? I don't know what to tell them because I I would be drawn to take them to temple because that's what was done with me. And I even I have a few friends that have children that maybe sort of feel the same way. Actually, I have a very, very, very Jewish friend. He grew up practicing all the, you know, the religion and stuff. And to this day, he's married to an Orthodox girl and they have children and their children are heavily involved in the Jewish religion. But he is an atheist. Yeah, but he's like the only atheist. Oh, no, no, no. You know what? And I didn't do the stats. I didn't do my homework. But a lot they see a lot of the Jews in Israel are atheists. I mean, I mean, I'm the more secularism, the more secularist than they are. Atheist, I think, which is somebody who just doesn't want religion and politics to mix. Oh, yeah. I didn't have a chance to do the research on that. No, you you you're not too far off from what I've seen from this. You know, the stats and everything. I think that there are a number of them who would claim either agnostic or atheist. But it's not what rules there, obviously. Oh, obviously. Yeah. You know, but it's odd that that a people that, in my opinion, God is really blessed that that they would hold that or even think about holding that opinion or. Well, a lot of the they their opinion is ignorance. A lot of them like, you know, from talking to a lot of them, it's not that there is no God. And, you know, most atheists are agnostic. We'll not come out and say that there's no God. They just I don't buy into it necessarily based upon what I see. A specific one. You mean a specific God? Yeah. Well, that's that's probably part of it. And what you know, what maybe draws people away from it is that there is a multitude of religions in the world, you know, twenty three actually major ones with thousands of denominations. Yeah. Like that's part of what also has swayed me away from, you know, having an absolute belief about God. But yeah, you know, I don't know. I think with Jewish people, it's. You know, it's maybe the education aspect of it, you know, Jews are the one thing that they're religious about is education, putting their kids into school and, you know, secondary college education and even postgraduate and all that stuff. So that stuff's going to make people think. And that might sway them away from being so religious, you know. But in the Bible, it's, you know, in the Exodus story, you know, it suggests that they're very rebellious, you know, a stiff neck people. Yeah. Well, you know, I think with with Judaism, there is the cultural aspect of it and then there's the religious aspect of it. So if you don't practice. The religious part, you still you're still maybe raised culturally. Yeah, right. Because it is it is a whole culture. Like you said, you know, you do certain things just because that's the day you're supposed to do those things on. And I just saw something about that from and the Yahoo News, it was from the American atheist president, who's a Jewish guy, David Silverman, and he's saying that the stuff that you practice as an if you're an atheist, you just say just say I go to, you know, the foods I eat and some of the things I practice and that's the things I practice. But the things we eat. And maybe some of the the light traditions are not religious. He says they're cultural. You know, I don't agree with him necessarily. But, you know, they are. Where's the line between the two? Right. I mean, you know, I don't know too many people who aren't Jewish who don't eat. Do you eat matzah? I we do for. Um, gosh, we don't eat. We don't eat matzah. We we eat unleavened bread. But I think a matzah balls in the chicken broth or whatever the broth is. Something that is the same, right? It's just mixed with matzah meal. It's a it's, you know, like a powder. Well, yes, it's not leavened. But, you know, matzah is a hardened. You can crack it. It's it's. What we eat for communion. Communion. Yeah. Like a wafer. Yeah, it's a it's a unleavened bread, like a cracker, almost like saltine. Yeah, it just doesn't have just bland. It's like it's like water and flour. But they do have flavor. They have, you know, onion even. It's like a bagel, which is also a popular Jewish thing. You know, I've never had the flavored. No, we just never had just spice up here. Yeah. Spice up your community. Give you a little Sriracha sauce on it. No, I think it was I think what you're saying about the brainwashing, I think it's true, but then also at the same time, it's also different because, you know, you're you're Jewish, but yet you you have all different types. Like coming from my dad, my dad was grown up Catholic. My dad grew up Catholic. He did the everything. He did the communion and he did all that stuff. But when he met my mom, I grew up Christian. My mom, my mom grew up. She didn't know God yet until someone came to her house and came to her house and told her, hey, you know, we have a church down the street. And she my grandma didn't even know this church was down the street, came to church. And then I grew up I grew up Christian. Now, when my mom and dad met each other, my grandparents had a big conflict with my grandma, with my mom, because they were like, oh, no, no. Catholic is better than Christian. And I was like, to me, I thought it was just all the same. You guys are worshipping the same people. But then as I got older, I talked to my dad about Catholic and he goes, yeah, we believe in the Mary, we believe in Joseph, we believe in all these other saints. I said, why do you believe in other saints? He goes, that's what I never he said. That's what that's what drove me away from it. Because your grandma and grandpa always fed it down my throat. Oh, you need to worship Mary. You need to worship saints and all this. And I was just like, I don't think that because I was I was pretty much what my grandma used to tell me is I was born Christian. I was born Christian because I grew up Christian. I grew up in the same church for up to like 18 years. Same church. My best friend that I know ever since I was born is from the same church as me. So. Pretty much when my dad met my mom, he he went from Catholic to Christian. And when he went that, he was like, I understand it more now. I understand what God is talking about more because in God and he read the Bible, he read it back and forth and then he read it with the pastor back and forth. And he understand it more that he understood what God is just saying, don't worship the saints. And it went it just tripped me out because it went from my grandparents going to Catholic to going to Christian now in my family. We have all different types of people now when we get together for gatherings, we have two cousins who are atheists now when they come over, they start a whole because they're just like, why do you believe in God? And they're just and my grandparents are like, because like it says in the Bible, who wrote the Bible? And then they're like, oh, well, you know, Jesus. How do you know he wrote the Bible? Were you there? And like they start quoting. And then it's just weird because first they go from atheists to they believe in Scientology to the point where like they just believe in. Well, Scientology is a is is you might be thinking science. Scientology is another religion, I believe. But I mean, it's all crazy. And I wanted to ask you, what would you teach your children? But we don't have any more time. I want to get some closing questions or closing comments. Comments. What do you need? I mean, come on. You. Right. Closing comments. Yeah. Based upon what we talked about today. Yeah. Oh, we had a great conversation today. I definitely want to do this again. I have so many. I can sit here and talk about one of the topics we talked about for days on end. So that's how it is. We hopefully we can do this again. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's the plan. So nice. Very, very interesting. Different different aspects from what I've been raised around. I've been raised in a Christian. I've been raised in a Christian family all my life. What I know is what I've read. Oh, and to touch real quick. I think what you were saying, I think that the only difference. Correct me if I'm wrong. Like the difference between Christian Christianity and Catholicism is the same thing and also the purgatory thing. So but it's still the same religion. You're still worshiping the same. Maybe worshiping the same God, but they have a lot of practices that aren't. Yeah, they worship. Mary is. And then they go to a priest for confession where I can talk directly to God. It's a whole different. Simply. Yeah. But simply. What my parents tell me is being shy, went to LACMA and we went to we went to go see some stuff and one of the crosses had Jesus on it still. And she's all like, why is that? I said, you know, difference between Catholics and Christians. Right. She said, no. She said, although on the top of the on the cross, it says the name. And I said, no, the difference between Christian and Catholics that my parents tell me were Catholics believing that God rose, but his body stood on the cross, Christians believing that God's body and his soul rose up to the heavens. So that's why if you notice, if you notice Christians where across without. Jesus and Catholics were with Jesus. I know I know that. I never know that either. I know we're just completely out of time. So what I'm going to say is we are never more like our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ than when we are loving, forgiving and creating. Thank you guys for tuning in to Positive Perspective. And I'll see you next time. Bye bye. Bye bye.!